>> you are watching american weekend, every weekend on c-span3. to join the conversation like us on facebook at c-span history. next on american history tv, we kanterf their jodie talk about how presidential libraries and museums shaper president's legacy. she is an author. the national archives at washington posted this hour-long event. good afternoon everyone, i would like to welcome you and our good friends from c-span to the mcgowan theater located in washington dc.

i am doug swanson, visiting service manager and producer of the series. begin today's program, i would like to remind you of other programs that will be taking place at this location in the near future. tomorrow evening on thursday, march 30 at seven: 30 p.m., the state of alaska is sponsoring a performance of the alaska chamber group as the state celebrates its centennial of the the russian america. on thursday, april 13 that semi-quiet p.m., we will present a panel discussion, 100 years, world war i and the weight of sacrifice where the discussion will center around the new national world war i memorial that will be built at persian park in washington dc. to find out more about these and our other programs, you can take one of our monthly event calendars in the lobby, or you can visit our website at www.

archives.gov/calendar. our topic for today is presidential libraries, curating george w. bush. kanter is a professor of the inner. colombian arts and sciences at george washington university. she has done a number of production at washington theaters. her focus was on strengthening communities through performance. workshops,ated events and productions in a wide variety of settings, including the inner, hospices, prisons, galleries, schools and other public spaces. her previous books, rebuilding community through writing explores how communities use performance to respond to shared experiences of grief. s articles have appeared

in text, theater annual, cultural studies desk sorry that is a big word, methodology and several other books. englisholds a ba in literature from harvard university. and a phd in performance study from northwestern university. she is a trained facilitator of the gusto balls dealer of the oppressed. -- theater of the oppressed. teaching,ards for her creative work and service. pre--- please join me in welcoming jodi kanter to the national archives. [applause] : thank you, i am

happy to be here. this setting is washington, d.c. it is winter of 1938. on in office,ens but not just any office, this one is so famous that it has its very own name, recognized around the world as a place of power. the oval office. desk inside the home he has called for the last president franklin roosevelt is worrying about history. in many ways this is the very practice for which the office was designed, but he is not at this moment worried about shaping the content of history, rather he is concerned about influencing public access to it. specifically, he is worried about whether millions of our systems from every part of the

land will have access to the historical documents of this time and place, to the story of what we have lived and are living today. he knows that he wants to be able to answer this question differently than it has been answered before. along with some of his contemporary, roosevelt is perhaps the first high-ranking politician to worry about public access, presidential history in this way. man.velt is not a selfless like any other head of state, he seeks to secure the place of the history of the nation. with it, the world. roosevelt has also begun to a critical consciousness about the relationship between history and power. has begun to understand the problems with the prevailing approach to history that howard zinn would influential he

articulate for the yield -- influentialy articulate for the years later. the past is told through leaders. they is -- it is as if like columbus deserve universal acceptance. the founding father, jackson, lincoln, roosevelt, kennedy. the leading members of congress represent the nation as a whole. traditional forms of public history, roosevelt recognizes, print up -- promote patriotism, but they also underrepresented thoseen misrepresent who lack the resources to make themselves heard. president roosevelt and his advisers were the first national leaders to act on this emerging american public history. they took in porton steps to embed within the public government, and approached the

public history that expanded the definition of the historic. through efforts such as the historic american building survey and the work progress administration with his federal writers program. president's initiative, they commissioned the first presidential library to preserve the primary sources of american history. making his presidential materials publicly available, roosevelt explicitly affirmed the historic value of broad civic participation. proclaiming his faith in, he said, the capacity of america's , so to learn from the past that they can gain and judgment increasing their own future. and, at the library's a small ceremony to

which he invited the facilities neighbors through an ad in the local newspaper. speculated that future generations of americans would be grateful for his foresight. share thatd to passage directly from my book because it is really the beginning. here is an image that you can find on the website of the of the or it -- library dedication of this first library. which was a community event in a very real sense. i wanted to tell you a little bit, for those who do not know, about the structure that roosevelt set up. by which presidential libraries

would be governed. could beture characterized as a public, private partnership. the way it worked was that future,t and, in the his presidential foundation and the presidential foundations of other presidents would raise the money to build the library. its firstoversee display. and, upon the dedication ceremony, at that very moment, theadministration of libraries would be transferred to the national archives. that arrangement has had, i influenceemocratizing on these institutions, the

public institutions of the presidential library. and, i think that democratizing impulse is probably no where near more glaringly demonstrated then at the nixon library. as some of you may know, the nixon library originally opened as a private library. a private institution. nixon opted out of the federal system and desk system. -- system.ash system there in suit of what they called the 30 year war. the faction represented by thought in daughters the courts and elsewhere about whether or not this library was going to become part of the national library system.

wasears later, that fight won by the faction that wanted .t to be a part of the system and the condition upon which thatchange was made was, there had to be a broader date exhibit in the new library. the first director of the library under the federal system , there were directors before, but this director was appointed by the national archives. they set about doing just that. in 2007, at this exhibit -- i smallst showing you a piece of a wall length exhibit. i wanted to show you this piece so you could see it in a little more detail.

exhibit, if it can be criticized, i would say it can only be criticized on the bases on sharing an overwhelming amount of information. inaired on the other side really giving a very extensive history of this very complex event of the watergate scandal. walldition to this full that you see here, there is also whiches of monitors on you can pull up oral history film.al and a it is a very large exhibit. this, sort of democratizing

influence of the national archives has continued. i say with great hope, it has , i think.onger for example, the reagan library took -- i believe it was 20 years. is that right? somewhere between 10 and 20 years to redo its exhibit so it gave a full accounting of the iran-contra scandal. that was a significantly shorter amount of time than it took to create this watergate exhibit. openede clinton library with the impeachment story as

part of the library. they do not even really think about not having it there. now, one hope for it to become more robustly represented over time. i expect that that will happen, but it was there when the exhibit opened. so, i am going to talk to you about some displays within the that i think illustrates this inclusive, and sort of democratic ideal of the presidential library. this is a favorite exhibit of mine from the carter library. this was not in the original carter library. ais exhibit resulted from renovation that they did in 2009

, which was 13 years after the library opened. changes inthe large was a veryibit expanded exhibit on carter's very early years. as you can see from the heading on the side, this exhibit really the african-americans in his skin me to the cool were extremely influential in his --ly years -- who african-americans in his community who were extremely inferential -- influential in his early years. it named those people and really -- the'sd

thisces he gained from intimacy with people who were different from him. this is not a display, but this is the outside of the clinton library. the clinton library was after they modeled slogan of his reelection campaign, which was a bridge to the 21st century. as you can a little bit tell here, the building looks like a bridge. most importantly, it looks like an unfinished bridge with the

end of it arcing out over the .rkansas river the idea in clinton speeches, and the idea that is embodied in the building, and in a lot of the displays was that, we all building and finishing the bridge. so, the display is inside the library and emphasizes a number -- forerent ways example, the clinton library has the most extensive exhibit on the vice presidency of any of the libraries. it also highlights his relationship with nelson mandela in number of different ways

which it emphasizes working together. actually, before we talk about the visitors experience, i want talk about a couple of other displays and other libraries. the first one i want to mention, but i do not have an image of it is at the hoover library in west branch, iowa. , tohoover library has what --is perhaps the most moving i guess you would call it a display of any of the libraries. that is a video that has its own little space in the library.

it shows excerpts from oral with peopleucted who were children in the first world war, and who were byluenced in profound ways hoover's humanitarian work. getting to hear these voices of ordinary people talking about the impact of his pre-presidential work on their lives is very moving. me.details are still with it was many years ago that i visited the hoover library, but there was a man who talks about the smell of the hoover roles when he first smelled them.

and how revolutionary that smell was for him. somebody else who talked about being a lot at his own plate by and thenitarian effort amazing experience of having his very own plate. the other one i wanted to mention, which i think is , is in theprising eisenhower library. the eisenhower library is the only presidential library, so , that dedicates space to communities of people who were struggling during the eisenhower years, during the presidential years. that exhibit at the eisenhower library is called, simply, the other america.

display on thee 1950's, all of the new inventions and cultural joys of the 1950's. in the next room, there is a large panel titled the other america, which begins with a -- something like, not all american shared in the boom times. it talks about three or four specific communities that really struggled during his presidency. i want to talk next about two into differents

presidential libraries, which i think contribute to this sense participation. the first one is in the george bush -- first george bush library, and it is called the goal for theater. far, the only example, so in the presidential libraries what people call an immersive exhibit. the visitor walks into the one of thesen crates that you see in the foreground of the graph -- foreground of the photograph, and mrs. dash listens to the voices of soldiers who fought in .he war being played

sort of like a collage of these voices talking about their experiences. when you cannot see in the photograph is that the lights shift while you are sitting .here listening the space in the center of the photograph that looks like it may -- looks like it may be a whole is actually a screen. screen shows images from the war, but very close up and somewhat abstracted images. you are not looking at tv footage of the gulf war, you are really looking at you vocative imagery. evocative imagery taken from the news footage. so, this exhibit really ,ncourages the visitor to stay

, and toput for a while experience in a number of different sensory and physical ways what it might have been like to be a part of that conflict. the second one i want to talk about is not an immersive exhibit, but it is an unusual example of library's way of dealing with the legacy of a president. i should pause here and say that, the presidential libraries are structured in similar ways. that structure is more or less chronological. you go off through in exhibit on the early years, then there prepresidential career, then there presidential years, then the post-presidency, then their

legacy. interested in how one .epresents a legacy this life that was such an participatory, though not in the sense of the george bush library, way of doing it. this exhibit is called lbj and you. whichks about the ways in continues toncy act upon our lives and our bodies today. bird in thisig photograph. to that a question next photograph that says, have you ever watched someone's television -- public television?

if you have watched public television than you have been influenced by this legacy. two images down from big word there is a boy buckling himself in with a seatbelt. the text says "have you ever used a seatbelt?" it is really intimate in a way, personal way of thinking about how leadership affects ordinary people. so, i will end with a few ideas about how i think the libraries can do better. happy to take whatever questions you might have. library --hat the libraries can do, and this is something i should say that withms in general struggle

, is to bring in a more diverse visitorship.-- clear,spoke with sammy who was the deputy director of of thential libraries national archives. i asked him why is it that you have never done any studies of who comes to the libraries, demographically? notaid, it is because we do need a survey to know how old and white we are. issue that we are aware of, and many other museums are aware of. i think there are a couple of ways to come at that, besides

public programming, which is sort of beyond what i am talking about today. displays, likee the ones that i have already mentioned, where people see citizens who look like them. right, who look like themselves. make clever use an innovative use of oral history materials. that there is this beautiful display at the hoover recent --t the most hoover library. at the most recent library, the george w. bush library, there is a space dedicated to collecting history. so if you are a visitor -- actually, i should say they are , they arenot oral

typed into a computer. but, if you visit there, you can include your story in the story of the bush years. which i think is exciting and i am interested in what they will do in terms of how they archive that material. another thing that i think has not been paid great attention to libraryction of the that i did not mention in my quick rundown, which i call the culture gallery. all of the not presidential libraries, there is where the visitor can see film posters and listen

to music, and look at video of movies, all in the interest of soaking up the time period. , find these culture gallery's in general, not so effective. the reason is, they are kind of a sensory bombardment. you have very small samples of .nfluential artwork it is just a little overwhelming to the senses. what would be interesting, i think, would be to step back from that approach to the cultural of the time period and really think about being more

choosing, and particularly influential pieces for the visual to get a larger sample of. maybe you would get to see an entire scene from a film, or entireou get to hear an song from the billboard list. anyway, i think that is one way, , to get at diversity. the other thing that some of the libraries are doing, in terms of thinking about democracy and andc purchase a patient -- civic participation is thinking about the role of the itselfntial library

plays in civic action. one thing i should note that has often been mentioned as a virtue of the presidential libraries is, they are not here in d.c. they are all over the country and some are in big cities, some are in small towns. they have that structural democratizing influence also in that they are available to people who otherwise might not be able to see them. some models of the kind of institutional thinking about civic action that i am thinking of our, probably most famously wascarter center, which developed at the same time as the carter library and is on the same campus.

within the presidential library there is a loss exhibit that is dedicated to the work of the carter center. you can learn all about what they do and how people become involved in their humanitarian work around the world. another and much less well-known firste of this is in the george bush library. at the end of the exhibit a have an electronic system set up a choose an issue that concerns you at the community level. you can type that issue into the computer and the computer will let -- will printout your -- ions in

cannot remember if it is zip chart the how they territory, but local organizations that are working on that issue. you can leave with this printout of places you can call to get involved. isn, finally, a library that thinking a great deal about itself as an institution, and what its role might be in strengthening communities civic participation is the obama library. which of course does not exist yet. but, consistent with his early , ik as a community organizer think that the board and the people at the foundation are really, from the get go thinking about what can we actually do in changeace that can make

, ande world around us support people in the world immediately around us? , i will close. i have not talked much about the title of my book, and i am happy to talk about that. of course there are lots and ofs of other great examples the things the libraries are doing. i will leave it there and turn to you for questions. [applause] oh, and i have been told to tell you that there are microphones on either side for you to be heard asking questions. hi, thank you very much for

your words today. i am a college student here in the washington dc area and have been greatly interested in presidential history for several years. find to behat i particularly interesting is that the fdrevelt library, library was dedicated when president roosevelt was still in office. i believe that is the only presidential library which existed when it subject was still in office. my question is, d think the fact that -- do you think the fact was president roosevelt still in office influence the roosevelt library in any major way? ms. kanter: that is a really interesting question. don't know.

well, it influence the library and one very concrete way, which is that, roosevelt used his office in that library. it was designed with that intention. so, there is that. of what i am guessing asking abouty which is the content of the displays and that kind of thing, itm not actually sure that did influence in a different way been death in a different way than any of the other presidents -- in a different way than any of the other presidents who were still around when it was being built.

do presidential libraries, which is why i am here. i was going to ask the question that you left us with, where does the title of the lecture and performance -- if you could tie the performance and the title. , and also in your phd degree? my background is in a discipline called performance studies, which is different from .heater studies performance studies is a discipline that looks at, and a fine's performance extremely broadly. so, the discipline is interested , for example, linking it

to the book, i am interested in how the libraries invite us to there.when we are i am interested in the role they create for the president, and the role they create for the citizen. as i said towards the end, i am interested in how the institutions themselves act in the world. does that clarify? thanks. my question was, how did you get interested in doing this, basically? so, i need a better story for this. but i will tell you that i had commentrtunity to thanks to the person i was dating at the time, who is now

, i hadand, who is here the opportunity to go to the clinton library soon after it opened. it was a thing that people were doing is going to the clinton library. and i found it fascinating. the first question i had when i e, i out of it was, ge wonder what the reagan library is light or he is the other two-term president that i have in my memory. i had the opportunity of going to the reagan library, and riting a article. i went to the reagan library and

inis dramatically different a zillion ways from the clinton library. there is actually a chapter in my book that compares those two libraries. started, ie i got just became fascinated by more than just the displays. i became interested in the and the division of labor between the foundation and the national archives. that, thereing is existed at the time only one libraries.esidential a came out in 2006. that study is written by a historian and the title of it is

presidential temple. glean from that title that this was a historian who was very dissatisfied with the presidential libraries as history. that he was -- he had interesting things to say, particularly interesting things to say about the truman library. it seemed to me that the presidential libraries were up tellingthan just history, which connects to the question about performance. -- i thought that my background and training gave me what they weren doing in the landscape besides just narrating history.

that was a long answer. thank you here it -- thank you. i am from the caribbean. on this in the george w. bush library, the gulf war. two questions. the change that was brought about in the nixon library concerning watergate, did that come about because of activities outside that people had been the inkith open protest shown, in fact that it was balanceot showing some version of what was going on inside during that time? second question is, concerning the relationship of the united states presidents -- basically

be -- basically they became the president of the matter world. united states became the dominant power. how do you think these libraries show the u.s. role in the world? you talked a bit about the johnson library. vietnam?t show for the kennedy library, or nixon? is any opportunity afforded in these libraries, not only to the u.s. citizens but people from the outside. countries on which the united states had impact to talk about the experiences concerning presidents from an american standpoint. ms. kanter: remind me of the first question. >> the change of the nixon library.

-- ihis a consequence of saw that in talking about the oppressed. the notion of the library radicalizing change in society. that can be problematic. the issue is problematic in a library,t if it is my i wanted to show me in a good light. that is the balance that you have. think that those things play out, and which library have you gone to do you -- maybe thelosest obama president? those are three questions. love to sayi would that the change in the nixon library came about through grassroots revolution. in fact, that is not what happened.

stake inhat was at that protracted reallyation/argument was nixon's place in history. the strong sense that some of had that, if he was excluded from the set of that was a fairly robust set of institutions that were tied together, that his -- might be diminished by that exclusion. meant having if it to tell him more complex, and somewhat less flattering story,

that it was worth doing that in in theo be included civic institution of the presidential library. conversation really was not among visitors. in fact, people who visited the library when it was a private library tended to be nixon supporters, therefore it tended to be -- with a private exhibit as it was. really colleagues and supporters of the president who had a different view of how to preserve his legacy best. of theater of the oppressed, that is such a great question. think, the first thing that

comes to mind is the eisenhower display, which is really -- in the grand scheme of things it is not really very radical. the context of these presidential libraries, the idea of really delving into, and it that exhibit could be bigger and deeper. the idea of really giving space whoairtime to communities were not doing so well under the eisenhower presidency, i think is an important contribution. i think my hope is that the obama library will go even further in that direction. i guess the carter center as well. certainly, if you are talking

betweene interaction the u.s. and other countries , the carterlly center does that more than any other institution in the system. i have a, and a question. the, piggybacks on your statement of how you will -- you are interested in the landscape of what the landscape of presidential library says. i went to the nixon library. at the end of the exhibit you see the tombs of mr. and mrs. nixon, then there is a little white house that you can tour. i assumed that they had moved the home to the library site, but i was told that no comment

he chose the site of his childhood home for his library, which i thought was interesting. an interesting statement about him. i understand the libraries are a partnership between private and public. -- does thelic private foundations stop its involvement when the government takes over, or do they continue to work together? ms. kanter: that is a great question, the answer is the latter that they continue to work together. has a lotal archives of the administrative responsibilities. foundation does things like, they run the gift , and they pay for certain exhibits that are above and the scope of the

presidential library is. for example, the most obvious example is, at the reagan library there is an air force one and exhibit where you walk into this glass enclosed room and air force one is sitting there before you. you can go in it. that exhibit was paid for by the foundation. one of the things i say in the book is that i think the libraries could be clearer about that. what who is supporting pieces of the story. foundation, there is an institutional relationship that is ongoing between the foundation and the library. i wanted to make some comment , or respond to your question about having more and more people visit the museums and

libraries, also people who represent much more of the fabric of american life. i was older, i had more time, and probably because i pass through abilene, kansas. am stuck. i am a recent resident baking to washington dc. yesterday i was at the american history museum. we spent a lot of time in the presidential area there. each of the presidents was listed. there were some children next to me and they made some comments. it occurred to me that we have that wonderful display their that cannot possibly give the kind of context that each of these lives is. the story of tell america. each one of them representing almost a decade in many cases. i was at the portrait museum, wonderful portraits.

it has taken me a lifetime to collect all the stories. if we could get more visibility about the libraries and their existence by just making some connections among our own existing withinations, so that the smithsonian, just referring to the existence of these things. i understand they are just like your previous answers. these are complicated organizations. all of these are complicated organizations, but i think there is a question of not knowing they exist. i was wondering if you think it is the complexity of organizations that keeps people from even knowing about them? i don't think so. the national archives has made some efforts in that direction. one really simple, but very comp fleet -- complete one. when you walk into any one of the libraries, you get a

pamphlet that says here are all the presidential libraries, you should go see them. that seems super obvious, but it was not the case 10 years ago. also, on the web they are making more connections. a visible presence -- presence of the national archives and in these of getting ease of- and an getting from one library on the web. that is an interesting one. something and what you said maybe want to mention -- made me ant to mention -- there is chapter in the book about failure, and about the representation of presidential failure in the museums. one of the things i am arguing , it is actually a great

service to visitors to include those stories. plug, if would just you have not been to the ford library, there is some really interesting documentation there. actually, in general, any of the libraries that deal with one term president's, sort of by definition, have to deal with the failure of being reelected. behough it did not always that way. i found myself really interested in the one term presidential libraries, even though i started out looking at these two term libraries. i think part of the reason is, chronologically speaking, there is a shorter story to tell.

i think the potential for depth is greater at those libraries. thank you so much. [applause] >> interested in american history tv? visit our website, c-span.org/history. you can give you upcoming programs and watch college lectures, museum tours, archival elms and more. american history tv at c-span.org/history. in case you missed it, on c-span, cia director mike pompeo on national security and wikileaks. our best todo quietly collect information on those who pose a real threat to our country, individuals such as

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school. you may not have read the studies or know the statistics, but they understand that only part tothe guide the future. >> secretary of state rex tillerson. u.s./russiased the relations. view of the relations is at a low point. there is a low level of trust between our two countries. foremost nuclear powers cannot have this kind of relationship. >> availablegrams are online by searching video library. monday night, a look at the role of economic analysis and regulation at the federal regulations commission with the public policy fellow. he is interviewed by the total

medications reporter for bloomberg. >> you're saying google should be regulated by providers. >> i am saying when congress starts thinking about what a future fcc would look like and we are thinking about discrimination by vertically platforms, the conversation should not be limited to isps. the threat google poses to the content space is just as significant as comcast or verizon. 8:00tch monday night at eastern on c-span2. >> located between the new museum of the american revolution and independence hall in philadelphia, the portrait gallery of the second bank of the united states houses more than 150 paintings of notable 18th and 19th century leaders, military officers, explorers, and scientists.